January 20, 2014

The Southern Queensland Country tourism area – which includes the South Burnett – welcomed 1.9 million domestic and international overnight visitors during the year to June 2013, and most of us appear to like them.

Tourism and Events Queensland released the results last week as part of a Social Indicators study for the Southern Queensland Country region, which also takes in the Southern Downs and Toowoomba.

Compared with Queensland as a whole, local residents are more likely to agree that they really like tourists (68 per cent compared with 57 per cent for Queensland).

Three in five residents want more tourists to visit the region (52 per cent compared with Queensland 45 per cent).

Seven in 10 support development growth – much higher that the State average (70 per cent compared with Queensland 59 per cent).

Most local residents seem to enjoy living here:  34 per cent (up 2 per cent from 2010) said they couldn’t think of anywhere else they would rather live. But they’re not as happy as Queenslanders as a whole … the average across the State was 39 per cent.

More than half indicated they enjoyed living in the Southern Queensland Country area but could think of other places they would equally enjoy.

Only 13 per cent said they only lived here because of circumstances and would prefer to live elsewhere.

Local residents are very welcoming of tourists with 57 per cent wanting more visitors to come; 40 per cent thought visitor numbers should stay about the same.

Only 3 per cent want fewer visitors and 7 per cent admitted either adjusting their lifestyle to avoid tourists or staying away from places tourists go; 68 per cent (up from 56 per cent in 2010) say they “like” tourists while 26 per cent (down from 33 per cent) only “tolerate” them.

Looking at development, 70 per cent (down from 71 per cent in 2010) are happy with continued growth in the region; 16 per cent are happy but want no more growth; 2 per cent want less tourism and 12 per cent want more growth but in a different direction.

Local residents identified some benefits of tourism, including increased regional pride (91 per cent); 59 per cent believed tourism brought important economic benefits; 39 per cent identified greater cultural diversity as a benefit.

However they also identified negatives: 47 per cent believed tourism increased prices (compared with 56 per cent across Queensland); 27 per cent believed tourism caused more disruption and 26 per cent thought it increased property values.